The Russian Synodal Bible (russian: Синодальный перевод, The Synodal Translation) is a Russian non-
Church Slavonic
Church Slavonic (, , literally "Church-Slavonic language"), also known as Church Slavic, New Church Slavonic or New Church Slavic, is the conservative Slavic liturgical language used by the Eastern Orthodox Church in Belarus, Bosnia and Herzeg ...
translation of the
Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...
commonly used by the
Russian Orthodox Church
, native_name_lang = ru
, image = Moscow July 2011-7a.jpg
, imagewidth =
, alt =
, caption = Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, Russia
, abbreviation = ROC
, type ...
,
Roman Catholic
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
, as well as Russian
Baptists
Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only ( believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul compe ...
and other
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
communities in Russia.
The translation dates to the period 1813–1875, and the first complete edition was published in 1876.
The first edition in
modernized orthography appeared in 1956. The first digital edition was prepared by the Moscow Patriarchate in 2000.
History
The translation began in 1813, after the establishment of the
Russian Bible Society The Bible Society in Russia (russian: Российское Библейское Общество) is a Christian non-denominational organization for translating and distributing the Bible in Russia, in languages and formats accessible to anyone.
Ea ...
and by permission of Czar
Alexander I Alexander I may refer to:
* Alexander I of Macedon, king of Macedon 495–454 BC
* Alexander I of Epirus (370–331 BC), king of Epirus
* Pope Alexander I (died 115), early bishop of Rome
* Pope Alexander I of Alexandria (died 320s), patriarch of ...
. The complete New Testament was published in 1820 and the Old Testament was already translated up to the book of Ruth when work on the project was halted in 1825(?). In that year the Russian Bible Society was disbanded and its translation work discontinued under a more conservative emperor
Nicholas I (between 1825 and 1855) due to its suspected seditious influence on the Russian population. It was again resumed and completed in the next reign, of
Alexander II.
The
Most Holy Synod
The Most Holy Governing Synod (russian: Святѣйшій Правительствующій Сѵнодъ, Святейший Правительствующий Синод) was the highest governing body of the Russian Orthodox Church betwee ...
entrusted the completion of the translation to four Orthodox theological academies, in
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...
,
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
,
Kazan
Kazan ( ; rus, Казань, p=kɐˈzanʲ; tt-Cyrl, Казан, ''Qazan'', IPA: ɑzan is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Tatarstan in Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Volga and the Kazanka rivers, covering a ...
and
Kiev
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...
. The complete Bible was published in 1876 and included the 1820s translation of the New Testament with very few changes, as well as the Old Testament, whose translation reflected the work done both before and after the period of reaction. The final editorship was performed by
Filaret, Metropolitan of Moscow
Metropolitan Philaret (secular name Vasily Mikhaylovich Drozdov, Василий Михайлович Дроздов; 26 December 1782 – 1 December 1867) was Metropolitan of Moscow and Kolomna and the most influential figure in the Russian ...
.
The translation of the
Old Testament
The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...
is based on the Jewish
Masoretic Text
The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; he, נֻסָּח הַמָּסוֹרָה, Nūssāḥ Hammāsōrā, lit. 'Text of the Tradition') is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) in Rabbinic Judaism. ...
, while that of the
New Testament
The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...
is based on the Greek printed editions of that time.
RBO.ru
/ref> This decision was grounded on Filaret's 1834 note "On the need of the Russian Church for a translation of the whole Bible from the original texts to the modern Russian language" and reflected the growing acceptance in the Russian theological community of the contemporary Western standards of Biblical scholarship of the time.
Official permission to use the Masoretic Text as preserved by the Jews (rather than relying on the Septuagint
The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond th ...
and/or the Church Slavonic translations as preserved by the Christians) was granted to Filaret by the Synod in 1862, even though technically the translation was already mostly completed by that time.
In the 1870s, when the complete Russian Bible was being finalized, the linguistic norms of the Russian language had already changed when compared to those of the early 19th century, when most of the translation work was completed. Nevertheless, the translations that were done earlier remained largely unchanged, due mostly to the considerably smaller scale of the entire translation project compared to what was done by the Russian Bible Society before it was closed in the 1820s.
The translation retains a strong reliance on the vocabulary and style of the Church Slavonic translation (9th century, first printed 1564).
The Synodal version remains a linguistic phenomenon of its own kind that left an imprint on both modern spoken Russian and literary Russian by introducing certain distinctive features of Church Slavonic.
A new edition of the 1876 translation was published in 1917, just before the Russian revolution.
The Moscow Patriarchate under Alexy I published the first edition in post-1917 orthography in 1956.
Beyond the orthographic changes, there were minimal corrections and some changes bring the text closer to modern standard Russian.
A new edition of 1968 included two maps and again had some modernisations of spelling and punctuation.
An edition published 1988 was almost identical to the 1968 one, with the correction a few typographical errors and the inclusion of three new maps. While the 1968 was almost exclusively for the internal use by the Russian Orthodox Church, the 1988 was sold publicly, and scans of this edition were uploaded to the early internet.
The first edition in digital typeset appeared in 2000, again with some normalization in spelling, punctuation and grammar. This edition had very limited circulation in printed form but was published digitally on the website of the Moscow Patriarchate.
A new edition published in 2008 again adapted some spellings (such as святого for святаго, шестой for шестый). The maps are the same as in the 1988 edition, but reproduced in better quality. The 2008 edition was reprinted in 2012, with the correction of a few misprints.
Text samples
See also
*Russian Bible Society The Bible Society in Russia (russian: Российское Библейское Общество) is a Christian non-denominational organization for translating and distributing the Bible in Russia, in languages and formats accessible to anyone.
Ea ...
* Bible translations into Russian
References
External links
Official Publisher
eBook for iPad / iPhone / Mac
eBook for Android / Google
E-text at archive.org
HTML version at patriarchia.ru
*{{in lang, ru}
Textological Basis of the Synodal Translation (the Old Testament) by Andrey Desnitskiy
1876 non-fiction books
Russian Orthodox Church in Russia
Russian books
Bible translations into Russian
History of the Russian Orthodox Church